The far-right tradition in France finds its origins in the Third Republic with Boulangism and the Dreyfus Affair. The modern "far right" or radical right grew out of two separate events of 1889: the splitting off in the Socialist International of those who chose the nation and the culmination of the "Boulanger Affair", which championed the demands of the former Minister of War General Georges Boulanger. The Dreyfus Affair provided one of the political division lines of France. Nationalism, which had been before the Dreyfus Affair a left-wing and Republican ideology, turned after that to be a main trait of the right-wing and, moreover, of the far right. A new right emerged, and nationalism was reappropriated by the far right who turned it into a form of ethnic nationalism, itself blended with anti-Semitism, xenophobia, anti-Protestantism and anti-Masonry. The Action française, first founded as a review, was the matrix of a new type of counter-revolutionary right-wing, and continues to exist today. During the interwar period, the Action française (AF) and its youth militia, the Camelots du Roi, were very active. Far right leagues organized riots.

The Socialist International was formed at the Paris Conference, which imposed doctrinal orthodoxy on socialists and demanded their allegiance to the international working class rather than their nation. This forced patriotic socialists to choose either their nation or the international workers' movement. Many chose their nation and fell into violent conflict with their former socialist comrades. Those who chose the nation and retained the strategy of violence, then used most often against their former comrades, formed much of the base of the radical right. Many of those people also proved susceptible to the blandishments of anti-Semitism, which has long been a hallmark of the radical right. This would include (socialist) Maurice Barrès, (communardes) Henri Rochefort and Gustave Cluseret, (Blanquists) Charles Bernard and Antoine Jourde, among others.[1][2]

Georges Ernest Boulanger (1837–1891)

The second event of 1889 was the culmination of the "Boulanger Affair" which championed the vague demands of the former Minister of War General Georges Boulanger. Boulanger had attracted the support of many socialists by ordering lenient treatment of strikers when the army was called upon to suppress strikes. He also rattled his saber against Germany which pleased French patriots intent on taking revenge against the German Empire. But his saber-rattling scared the other ministers who dumped Boulanger from the government. When his champions mounted an electoral campaign to have him elected to the Chamber of Deputies, the government reacted by forcing him out of the Army. His backers then elected him to the Chamber again from Paris, where he gained the support of both conservatives, who loathed the Republic, and socialists with their own ideas about how the Republic should be remade. This joining of the left and right against the center formed the foundation upon which the radical right was built in subsequent years. Violent agitation in Paris on the election night in 1889 convinced the government to prosecute Boulanger in order to remove him from the political scene. Instead of facing trumped up charges, Boulanger fled to Belgium. His supporters, "Boulangists" afterward nursed an intense grievance against the Republic and reunited during the Dreyfus Affair to oppose the Republic and "back the army" once again.;;[3][4][5]

However, in 1894, a Jewish officer, Alfred Dreyfus, was arrested on accusations of treason and sharing intelligence with the German Empire. The Dreyfus Affair provided one of the political fault lines of France. Nationalism, which had been before the Dreyfus Affair a left-wing and Republican ideology, turned after that to be a main trait of the right-wing and, moreover, of the far right.[6]

But in the midst of the Dreyfus Affair, a new right emerged, and nationalism was reappropriated by the far right who turned it into a form of ethnic nationalism, itself blended with anti-Semitism, xenophobia, anti-Protestantism and anti-Masonry. Charles Maurras (1868–1952), founder of "integralism" (or "integral nationalism"), created the term "Anti-France" to stigmatize "internal foreigners", or the "four confederate states of Protestants, Jews, Freemasons and foreigners" (his actual word for the latter being the far less polite métèques). A few years later, Maurras would join the monarchist Action française, created by Maurice Pujo and Henri Vaugeois in 1898. Maurras, who was an agnostic, spearheaded a monarchist and Catholic revival. He pragmatically conceived of religion as an ideology useful to unify the nation. Most French Catholics were conservatives, a trait that continues today. On the other hand, most Protestants, Jews and atheists belonged to the left-wing. Henceforth, the Republicans' conception was, to the contrary, that only state secularism could pacifically gather the diversity of religious and philosophial tendencies, and avoid any return to the Wars of Religion. Furthermore, Catholic priests were seen as a major, reactionary force by the Republicans, among which anti-clericalism became a common spread. The Ferry laws on public education had been a first step for the Republic in rooting out the clerics' influence; they would be completed by the 1905 law on the separation of Church and State.

The Action française, first founded as a review, was the matrix of a new type of counter-revolutionary right-wing, and continues to exist today. The Action française was quite influential in the 1930s, in particular through its youth organization, the Camelots du Roi, founded in 1908, and which engaged in many street brawls, etc. The Camelots du Roi included such figures as Catholic writer Georges Bernanos or Jean de Barrau, member of the directing committee of the National Federation, and particular secretary of the duc d'Orléans (1869–1926), the son of the Orleanistcount of Paris (1838–1894) and hence Orleanist heir to the throne of France. Many members of the OAS terrorist group during the Algerian War (1954–62) were part of the monarchist movement. Jean Ousset, Maurras' personal secretary, created the Cité catholiqueCatholic fundamentalist organization, which would include OAS members and founded a branch in Argentina in the 1960s.

After this brief passage at the National Front, Mark Fredriksen created the Faisceaux nationalistes européens (FANE) in July 1980. These would eventually merge with the Mouvement national et social ethniste in 1987, and then with the PNFE (French and European Nationalist Party) in January 1994, which also gathered former National Front members.

Dissolved first in September 1980 by Raymond Barre's government, Fredriksen's group was recreated, and dissolved again in 1985 by Laurent Fabius' government. Finally, it was dissolved a third time in 1987 by Jacques Chirac's government, on charges of "violent demonstrations organized by this movement, which has as one of its expressed objective the establishment of a new Nazi regime," the "paramilitary organisation of this association and its incitations to racial discrimination."

The Club de l'horloge itself had been founded by Henry de Lesquen, a former member of the conservative Rally for the Republic, which he quit in 1984. Others members of the Club de l'horloge, such as Bruno Mégret, later joined the FN after a short time in the RPR.

During the 1980s, the National Front managed to gather, under Jean-Marie Le Pen's leadership, most rival far-right tendencies of France, following a succession of splits and alliances with other, minor parties, during the 1970s.

The PFN was formed mainly by former members of New Order (Ordre nouveau, 1969–1973), who had refused to merge in the FN at its 1972 creation. New Order, dissolved by Interior Minister Raymond Marcellin in 1973, was itself a successor to Occident (1964–1968) and of the Union Defense Group (GUD, Groupe union défense).

Close to the Third Position and "national-revolutionary" thesis, this tendency maintained links with the FN, despite some tensions. The GUD, in particular, had published the satiric monthly Alternative with the Youth Front (Front de la jeunesse), youth organization of the FN. They also had attempted alliances with other far-right parties in Europe, with New Order organizing the alliance "A Fatherland for Tomorrow" (Une patrie pour demain) with the Spanish Falange, the Italian Social Movement (MSI) and the German National Democratic Party.

These succeeding electoral defeats prompted the far-right to unify itself. In 1983, the FN managed to make its first electoral breakthrough, taking control of the town of Dreux. Jean-Pierre Stirbois, obtained 17% of the votes at the first round, for the FN municipal list. At the second round, he merged his list with Chirac's RPR list (headed by Jean Hieaux), enabling the right a victory against the left. Chirac supported the alliance with the far-right, claiming the Socialist Party, allied with the Communist Party in government, had no lessons to give.[16]

These electoral defeats, which contrasted with the high score obtained at the 2002 presidential elections, have caused financial problems to the FN, who was forced to sell its headquarters, the Paquebot, in Saint-Cloud. Le Pen then announced, in 2008, that he would not compete again in presidential elections, leaving the way for the competition for the control of the FN between his daughter, Marine Le Pen, whom he favored, and Bruno Gollnisch.[18] The latter had been condemned in January 2007 for Holocaust denial,[19] while Marine Le Pen attempted to follow a smoother strategy to give the FN a more "respectable" image.

Bloc identitaire, an offshoot of Unité Radicale, dissolved after Brunerie's assassination attempt, which organizes so-called "identity soups" ("soupes identitaires"), that is "popular soups" with pork in order to exclude religious Jews and Muslims from them.

Hutton, Patrick. "Popular Boulangism and the Advent of Mass Politics in France, 1886-90" Journal of Contemporary History (1976) 11#1 pp. 85–106 in JSTOR

Irvine, William. The Boulanger Affair Reconsidered, Royalism, Boulangism, and the Origins of the Radical Right in France (Oxford University Press, 1989)

Kalman, Samuel, and Sean Kennedy, eds. The French Right Between the Wars: Political and Intellectual Movements From Conservatism to Fascism (Berghahn Books; 2014) 264 pages; scholars examine such topics as veterans and the extreme right, female right-wing militancy, and visions of masculinity in the natalist-familialist movement.